


You're calling to me (I can't hear what you've said)

by FantasticalNonsense



Category: A Discovery of Witches (TV), All Souls Trilogy - Deborah Harkness
Genre: (canon will back this up), Character Study, F/M, Introspection, Repressed Memories, and Matthew's perverted thoughts, spoilers for Shadow of Night, spoilers for The Book of Life
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-01
Updated: 2019-03-01
Packaged: 2019-11-07 12:41:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,673
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17960738
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FantasticalNonsense/pseuds/FantasticalNonsense
Summary: "I think Matthew made it for you–only he did not realize it at the time..." - Ysabeau de Clermont, The Book of LifeHow can something be foreign and familiar at the same time? A tale of honey, a bed, and how the two came together to help a vampire finds his mate.





	You're calling to me (I can't hear what you've said)

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [Half Past the Point of No Return](https://archiveofourown.org/works/17590553) by [EllieL](https://archiveofourown.org/users/EllieL/pseuds/EllieL). 



> So, first fic for this fandom and first fic for 2019! It's been way too long since I last posted to the Archive. Please pardon any clunky sentences or bad editing. 
> 
> This was inspired by several ADoW/All Souls fics, most noticeably the works of EllieL who does a much better job at capturing Matthew's inner struggles than I ever could. It's also inspired by [this Tumblr discourse](http://fantasticalnonsense18.tumblr.com/post/182702355845/fuckyeahmatthewanddiana-di-elle); I borrowed some of Alain's dialogue from @brooke-to-broch's mini-fic to flesh out the idea of Matthew being "ill" during those months he was displaced in time.
> 
> "A Discovery of Witches (All Souls Trilogy)" is the property of Deborah Harkness and Bad Wolf Productions. The author makes no claim to these characters beyond the use of this fanwork.
> 
> Title is taken from Time After Time by Boyce Avenue (originally performed by Cyndi Lauper). For listening, click [here](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tpm_kITevv0).

_Her golden hair shines red in the candlelight. He pushes back a few errant tendrils that have fallen into her eyes. Those bright, blue eyes that pierce his body and see straight into his heart. Into his soul. She clings to him like a vice, engulfing him in her warmth—in her love—as they move in tandem. He kisses the column of her throat and drinks in her scent._

_Willow sap. Chamomile. Frankincense. Lady’s Mantle._

_Honey._

Matthew opens his eyes.

Moonlight streams into his bedchamber, highlighting the empty corners and dark shadows that linger about him. There’s no one else here. He’s alone.

Groaning, he sits up and runs his hands over his face. From the village, the church bell tolls the hour. Midnight. He’d slept through the whole day. As he shifts, the scent is released from the bedclothes, filling his nostrils with its subtle sweetness and something distinctly female. He reaches out to the empty space next to him and for a moment, he’s overcome with a deep, intense longing that steals his breath and threatens to consume him.

There’s something about this scent, something foreign yet familiar that he can’t quite place. He tries, but the last seven months are a blur since Chester and he still feels disoriented (Gallowglass’s gleeful face when he declared him cured of his strange illness did not help matters). What he does remember stands out like stars against a dark, menacing sky, so far-flung that he can make no connection between one point and the next. Did he take a woman to bed here, at the lodge, during this lost time? Unlikely; he’s always seen to other rooms for those needs, and his household wouldn’t have permitted it while he was ill.

And yet….

Matthew thinks back to Alain’s comments when he awoke, fully recovered. His father’s most steadfast servant had been dispatched upon learning of his condition, explaining that he’d taken blood from some passerby who wasn’t well. _“_ You left us, suddenly. Talking nonsense all the time, acting like there was a woman traveling with you when nobody was there.” He tried to get the name of the woman, believing it to be Blanca, or perhaps Eleanor. Who else but his long-dead loves could inspire such visions? But Alain only shrugged. _“_ You gave no name, Milord.”

He growls. Whoever this phantom woman is he reasons that she’s little more than a remnant of his illness clinging to his addled mind, brought on by his guilt and a change to the washing of his bedclothes. Yes, that must be it. He needs to purge himself of the toxins, of the damn scent. He needs to hunt.

Gathering his clothes and boots, he dresses in the bare essentials and stalks out of the lodge and into the night.

 

~ ~ ~

 

The Great Fire was unfortunate for the loss of the family’s London base. Privately, Matthew’s pleased to quit the Blackfriars altogether. The decades leading up to the disaster had seen a rise in crime, poverty, and intolerance in the neighbourhood, making it a dangerous place for Creatures like himself to occupy. He purchases a new house in Mayfair that reflects his status as a de Clermont and distances him from his espionage past. He fills it with his favourite art and furnishings and keeps company with the finest thinkers of the age. In time, he settles comfortably into his new life and places the past behind him.

Then he finds the bed.

Most of his furnishings from the Hart and Crown were lost to the fire; the articles that were spared were packed up and relocated by his staff when he left England in the seventeenth century. By chance he happens across it in Woodstock, tucked away in storage, waiting to be rediscovered.

He inspects the frame thoroughly. It had sustained some damage but the oak structure is intact and retains a dignified air with its clean lines and carved panels, a sharp contrast to the modern love for scrolling vines and frivolous, flowery curricles. It takes him back to a different time—a simpler time, in some ways—when he enjoyed long evenings in his rooms with Kit, Hal, Walter, Thomas, and George, sharing drink and conversation against the backdrop of the bustling neighbourhood with the moon shining full and bright on London town.

_(—bathed in moonlight she clung to him, ran from him, deeper into the wood, that sweet, mocking laugh bubbling from her lips—)_

He shakes his head.

He’s been meaning to decorate his Mayfair bedchamber but lacked inspiration; now, ideas are flowing into his mind at a rapid pace. He pictures a forest at night, all dark woods and veiled shadows, with hints of greenery illuminated by the glow of the moon. It’s not fashionable, but aristocrats care little for fashionable rooms—they leave that to the bourgeoisie.

He begins by creating a recess to set the bed into the wall to lend more space to the room. Then he sets to work on the walls, papering them with hand-painted depictions of branches and leaves against a pale-gray background, utilizing silver accents to give the effect of moonlight streaming down. He struggles with the ceiling: he wants to depict the night sky emerging from the overhanging branches with the moon at its center but the effect comes off as one-dimensional and uninspiring.

He thinks back to a painting he recently viewed depicting Hecate, the goddess of witchcraft, and a supplicant seeking her counsel. He particularly recalls how the artist was able to capture the goddess as one with the night, wearing the sky like a starry veil. With this in mind, he returns to the ceiling and applies the technique to create a translucent black canopy over the forest boughs entangled with silver stars, with four depictions of Nyx anchored to the four quadrants of the room to support the "veil" of night. At the center, as he envisioned, sits a round, polished mirror, catching the light of the stars and the accents on the walls.

He completes the room by adding the bed, a heavy-set chest of drawers, a small, elegant dressing table and several choice pieces of furniture, upholstered in rich green silk and accented with hints of gray, white, and silver to match the walls. He adds a large mirror above the fireplace to increase the light and hangs the witch painting—the one that urged him on—between the windows, parallel to the bed.

Matthew takes in his work. It was lovely, lovelier than he dared hope.

And not worthy for him to use.

In the end, he moves into the room next door.

 

~ ~ ~

 

He knows he should be questioning her about Ashmole 782 rather than volunteering information about himself, yet the sight of Diana, here, at the Old Lodge, gives him pause. Matthew observes her drinking in the Tudor architecture, the paintings, the furniture and trappings of lifetimes past. Her eyes—those beautiful blue eyes—sparkle with curiosity as they venture deeper into the house, and he can practically see her filing away these tidbits in her head for later. It unnerves him as much as it thrills him to share this with her.

Her fingers gently trail along old wood panels and worn book spines, tracing the details as though she could read their history with a mere touch. He wonders (briefly) how those fingers would feel along his spine, tracing his scars, running through his hair in the grips of passion…

Matthew starts and returns to the tasks at hand: namely, helping her place Godfrey’s copy of the _Aurora Consurgens_ in a makeshift cradle of books to support the delicate binding. She smiles at him and sits at the desk, opening the text with a deftness that demonstrates her professionalism and care.

He relaxes into the settee and cradles his glass of wine, content to watch her read. From a distance, her warm honeyed scent is less distracting but still palpable. It calls to him in a way that went beyond his craving for her blood: it sung with a note of familiarity that seemed magnified by the house’s closed corners. She asks a few questions about his books, what he’s read, if he possesses other editions or similar tomes. He answers them carefully, determined not to reveal too much—yet he can’t resist mentioning his first edition of Boyle’s _The Sceptical Chymist_ which was, sadly, in London.

His thoughts turn to Clairmont House. He wonders if she’d be as appreciative of his London residence as she was of the Old Lodge. He’s certain she’d love the library, where he kept most of his seventeenth and eighteenth-century scientific treatises. Perhaps the ballroom, if only for the allegorical frescos that covered the ceiling. He can picture her soaking in the details with an appreciation for their age and historic value, inquiring if there were others like it in the house. He’d say yes, and, taking her hand, would lead her up to the Green Bedroom. She’d follow him, so trusting, as they stepped through the threshold, her pulse quickening with pleasure as she absorbed its ethereal beauty.

The silver light from the mirrors would illuminate her hair, her eyes, her skin, as though she was an extension of the room itself. She’d make her way to the bed, removing her outer layers piece by piece and beckoning him forth with a wicked smile. He would take her in his arms and kiss her soundly, lower her onto the silk coverlet, remove those last barriers of clothing and drink in the warmth of her skin, her blood…

No. Focus. This isn’t about Diana, he chides himself. This is about Ashmole. Not her curiosity or her brilliance or the aching familiarity of her scent that threatens his carefully constructed self-control.

His association with her is bad enough. He won’t risk her life further by succumbing to his craving.

 

~ ~ ~

 

It doesn’t hit Matthew until later—much later—that he’s never pictured anyone with him in the Green Bedroom before.

**Author's Note:**

> In The Book of Life, Matthew says to Diana that nobody ever seemed worthy of occupying his rooms in Clairmont House, yet he could picture her in them (with him, of course) almost immediately after they met. I suspect this occurred the first time Matthew took Diana to the Old Lodge which unlocked some unconscious memories of their time together in 1590 and wanted to apply that to the showverse. 
> 
> Side note: don't take my depiction of the Blackfriars as gospel. I couldn't find any reliable sources on the state of the neighbourhood in the seventeenth century before the Great Fire hit. I do believe that Matthew had many a restless night in his rooms at the Hart and Crown after his future-self and Diana's departure, and being endlessly frustrated as to why this was happening.


End file.
